St Patrick's celebrate excellent results

Sean McMahon

At St Patrick's

There was much joy and good news stories among the the 92 Leaving Cert students in St Patrick's College, when they opened their envelopes. Many stole away to a private corner, and more sought the support of their equally nervous parents in the car, as the moment of discovery arrived. That three students totted up their results and found they broke the 600 mark was an astonishing achievement of which any school would be justly proud. Further studies in Science and Computer Science now await those accomplished minds.
Principal Chris Rowley was delighted by the grades achieved by students across the board.
“The honours English results here in the college were tremendous with a good splattering of H1s – it was a standout subject, as was history this year – there were a lot of H1s there too,†said Chris Rowley.
The science results were very good, and while at the time of speaking to the Celt he had not had the chance to comprehensively analyse the results, the anecdotal response appeared positive.

“From talking to the lads after opening their results, they were very happy,†Principal Rowley said.

John Grogan was one of those students the Celt met in the college's corridor to have the delight of achieving good grades. The Milltown lad did all honours with the exception of Irish, and was delighted to claim the 25 extra bonus for Maths. All things being equal John seems destined to progress to DCU to study Bio Medical Engineering.

Mark Dolan from Carrigallen opened his envelopes in the privacy of his parents' car, and pleased with his seven honours results. Chatting to the Celt in the school car park he happily reported he had surpassed the points required last year to get into his first preference course of Commerce in UCD.

New marking system

Principal Rowley said that while it took a little while to evaluate the new marking system and correlate the points, he was happy that it appeared to have resulted in a higher uptake of honours subject.

“There is that little safety net of points there. It may take a couple of years to evaluate it and see where we are at with the new system,†he said.

He added that the “great fairness†in the Leaving Certificate is that it “rewards hard workâ€.
A lot of this year's St Patrick's College students are progressing onto courses in engineering, science, technology, business and finance.